JANUARY

WE started January 2018 with a traditional splash, as the annual

Mappleton Bridge Jump got underway. And there was good news for our first front page of the year – Ashbourne was singled out as one of the nation’s top 10 property hotspots, with house prices growing by an average of 11.59 per cent in 2017.

Some £200,000 of public money was set to be thrown at a scheme to build a new link road into the Airfield Industrial Estate. Derbyshire Dales District Council planned to throw the huge sum of money into the development fund to ensure it had a chance of being built by the end of 2018.

A new £100,000 CCTV system was installed in the town and hundreds of tickets went on sale for the 2018

Glitz and Glamour fundraising ball – but sold out in just two hours.

January was also a month that saw plenty of wild weather. With Storm

Fionn toppling trees into gardens and onto houses in Brookside Meadows and heavy snow falling in the second half of the month.

We ended the month by revealing the two Shrovetide balls which were due to be tossed into the hug in 2018. Queen’s representative Willie Tucker and local sportsman John Webb were each looking forward to seeing their leathers for the first time, ahead of a relatively early Shrovetide just two weeks later.